Errors memorialized in scholarship…..

July 18, 2009



The “church” often embraces traditions to the detriment of accuracy in theology.

An example of this is the simplistic proclimation that the Old Testament “is about the Jewish people.” The church proclaims it and embraces it and presto, without asking if that statement is true or if it even makes sense, tradition and sentiment proclaim it so therefore it is.

So often theology has used its feelings and traditions as a source of scholarship in opposition to studying the recorded words of the bible writers and drawing their conclusions from those things recorded and not from customs and hearsay.

In today’s study, such is the case where an answer is given to the prophesy from the patriarch Jacob of a sceptre being with the line of David to the time of the Messiah.
(Gen 49:10)

In antiquity there is a volume known as the Complutensian Polyglot Bible published in the 16th century. In which the effort is made to link the end of the kings of Israel at the time of Zedekiah to the birth of the final King who would hold the sceptre; Yeshua/Jesus. Remember Jacob said the sceptre would not depart from Judah until Shiloh (The Anointed) comes. Its purpose being to explain the gap in the Davidic monarchy over the chosen people of God during this time.

This from that book … "A summary view of the principal events of the period from the close of the sacred canon of the Old Testament until the times of the New Testament."

According to the system of chronology which this work adopts, the overthrow of Zedekiah occurred in the year 589 B. C. The summary begins after the return of the Jewish people from the Babylonian captivity, but while they were still under the dominion of the Kingdom of Persia; and when Artaxerxes Longimanus was the reigning king, who in his 20th year commissioned Nehemiah to rebuild the walls of Jerusalem, an event which happened, according to the chronology used, in 446 B. C.
Then follows a brief record of the death and successions of kings, the rise and fall of dynasties, and the overthrow of kingdoms, powers, dominions and empires. But it is always stated conclusively that these ruling powers, whatever might be their nationality, were dominating the Jewish people.

J.H. Allen in his classic study; Judah’s Sceptre and Joseph’s Birthright eloquently records it this way - "The summary shows that Alexander the Great marched into Judea to punish the people for certain grievances which, in his mind, they had practiced against him as commander of the Grecian forces, and that God thwarted him in that purpose. It shows that when Alexander died the Grecian empire was divided among his four generals; that Palestine was given to Loamedon, one of those generals, and that it was soon taken away from him by Ptolemy, the king of Egypt, that they "rejoiced to submit to this new master," and what the consequences were. It shows what they suffered under Antiochus Epiphanes, especially after a false rumor had been spread concerning his death, which they believed and rejoiced in, and that in consequence of this rejoicing "he slew 40,000 persons, sold as many more for slaves, plundered the temple of gold and furniture to the amount of 80 talents of gold, entered the Holy of Holies, and sacrificed a sow upon the altar of burnt offerings, and caused the broth of it to be sprinkled all over the temple." No greater indignity than this could have been put upon that people. The summary continues, a truthful record of suffering after suffering, trouble after trouble, and indignity after indignity, heaped upon that conquered people, who during all those centuries were reigned over by their enemies, the Gentile nations; but not once does the record show -- no not for even one generation -- that they were ruled by a prince of their own royal house."

Finally, the summary ends as follows:

"At length Antipater, a noble but crafty Idumean, by favor of Julius Caesar, was made procurator of Judea, and Hyrcanus continued in the priesthood. After Antipater's death, his son, Herod the Great, by the assistance of Antony, the Roman triumvir, and through much barbarity and bloodshed assumed the regal dignity; which authority was at length confirmed by Augustus Caesar. He maintained his dignity with great ability, but with the utmost cruelty, in his own family as well as among others, till the birth of Christ. In the interval he built many cities, and, to ingratiate himself with the Jews, almost rebuilt the temple.
His crude attempt to murder the infant Saviour is recorded by the evangelist; and soon afterward he died most miserably. After some years, during which the dominions of Herod were governed by his sons, Judea became a Roman province, and the sceptre departed from Judah, for Shiloh was come [the italics are their own]; and after having been under the government of Roman procurators for some years, the whole Jewish state was at length subverted by Titus, the son of Vespasian."

The sophistry in the use of those italicized words, as employed by the compilers of that summary, is that they destroy the evident meaning of that prophecy to which they refer, by the substitution of various sceptres -- held by various kings, of various Gentile nations, that have consecutively held dominion over the Jewish people -- for one particular Sceptre, which the Lord promised should be held, only by some member of Judah's family line, and which should not cease to be held by those of his posterity until Shiloh should come."

So here’s the question. Was the prophecy of Jacob true that there would be royal blood saved to the time of The Anointed? Or once again do we believe that all of God’s inspired words aren’t necessarily so?

Chew on that awhile and we’ll dig deeper next time.